Tag Archives: TOOL

BMC : The MC-12A (PartI)

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The MC-12A, the most advanced acquisition tool.
As you can see, it fits perfectly with the PC-1500/CE-150 system.
BMC_MC-12A_002

What can this do ?
– Digital Multimeter -5V to +5V
– Data logger
– Transient
– Fonctions generator
– Data analyzer
– Regulation/Control unit

How can it communicate ?
– 5 input channels
– 2 analog outputs
– 4 CMOS switch
– 2 output relays
– 24 pol. l / O port
– V.24 interface
– 60 pins connector to PC-1500 or CE-150

It’s a strong tool, isn’t it ? It’s as wide as the CE-150.
BMC_MC-12A_001
BMC_MC-12A_004 BMC_MC-12A_005

The power supply adapter EA-150 is plugged directly in the MC-12A and is transferred to the CE-150 with a grey cable.
A very nice idea !
BMC_MC-12A_006

Removing the CE-150 is not really easy. You have to remove 2 screws and move the printer to separate it.
BMC_MC-12A_008 BMC_MC-12A_007

DO you see the white tube on the metal plate ? It goes directly to a hole under the CE-150.
BMC_MC-12A_009

Here is the CE-150 connector :
BMC_MC-12A_010

Now let’s opening the MC-12A and see inside.
There are some options installed. A really good thing ? All the ICs are on sockets ! Easy repairing…
BMC_MC-12A_011
There is a place on the left with corroded marks. It’s the battery.
The whole system can be used out of 110/220v ! You can take it and go on site.
BMC_MC-12A_017

Let’s open a bit more… there is a RAM and a ROM. Two sockets are unused for future extension.
BMC_MC-12A_012

The ROM IC will give you a really good surprise… stay tuned…

TRAMsoft Gmbh, Swiss know-how ! (part 1)

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In the 80s we saw a lot of things appear for the Sharp PC-1500. Listings, tapes, memory modules and Eprom … and rare extensions.
In 1983 a company was established in Switzerland by two young graduates of technical high school “Technikum Winterthur” Reto Ambühler and Thomas Müller. With their initials they named their company TRAMsoft.

Reto TRAMsoft_logo Thomas

There are some months I contacted them and Reto was kind enough to answer me. He also agreed to give me a few things which I will soon. I hope Thomas will say us a few words and tell us this wonderful time of the arrival of the PC-1500.

But back to their company and their products … that still exist !
And you can order their last items for PC-1500 and PC-1600 😉

They were interested in the PC-1500 and managed to overcome its limitations both in terms of the Basic language as its features.

Thus users are able to “open” their machines to the environment.
Their best-known products are the TOOLS.
There are 4 TOOLS organized by theme.

TOOL1: Editing utilities
TOOL2: Fast tape operations
TOOL3: Additional BASIC-functions
TOOL4: Statistics and synthetic programming

TOOLS on TRAMsoft website

But unlike the EC-50xA/B Sharp modules, the TOOLS do not come onto the memory port on your machine but in an external box. You can continue to use your extensions CE-151, CE-155, CE-159 and CE-161 and the program modules from Sharp.
All these TOOLS can all be integrated into the same housing. Great, right?

Here is their flyer from 1986:

TRAMsoft_Advert_001 Full advert 1 as .pdf file

Reto sent me other versions of their commercials :

TRAMsoft_ExpansionBox Full advert 2 as .pdf file

Thanks to trade with other people I acquired a catalog of “Ingenieurbüro Walter Speidel” dated 1984. Their tools are already on the market but we can see that at that time the TOOLS have yet no box. It is printed with EPROM circuit, address decoding and a connector.

TRAMsoft_IWS0
Extract from IWS catalog as .pdf file

The prices are quoted in Deutschmark.
At that time I was living in Germany and remember that conversion to Franc had a ratio close to 3 This gives us about 150 euro for each TOOLS.

Ah, perhaps you noticed the initials “Ingenieurbüro Walter Speidel”? This will be the topic of another article by the end of the year …;)

For now I leave you to discover the site TRAMsoft.
http://www.tramsoft.ch/index_en.html